0:10
hi I'm Dustin Abbott and I'm here today
0:12
to give you my review of the 7 Artisans
0:14
AF 24mm f1.8 In 2024 seven artisans not
0:19
only embraced autofocus with some
0:22
earlier less complex lenses but also a
0:24
series of slightly more upscale
0:27
full-frame frame lenses that are
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physically larger They have more
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features but they also have a higher but
0:34
still really inexpensive price tag First
0:36
we got a 50mm f1.8 then an 85mm f1.8
0:41
both at an excellent price of
0:44
$299 But the l market was really pretty
0:48
saturated already with both 50 and
0:50
85mimeter f1.8 lenses on Sony E-mount
0:54
where I've done all of these reviews
0:56
which made these lenses I think probably
0:58
somewhat of a challenge to stand out So
1:01
perhaps that's why seven artisans
1:03
elected to at least for now skip the
1:05
35mm focal length and instead bring out
1:08
a less common 24mm f1.8 8 So the 7
1:13
Artisan's AF 24mm f1.8 STM is another
1:18
nicely executed lens with a reasonable
1:20
price that undercuts the only real
1:23
competitors at this Those are the
1:25
Samyang AF 24mm f1.8 and the Viltrox AF
1:29
24mm f1.8 In many ways this lens is
1:33
probably too similar to the Viltrox for
1:36
it to be a true competitor because this
1:38
does basically everything the Viltrox
1:40
does at a cheaper price leaving the
1:42
Samyang as the real kind of direct
1:44
competition which I'll examine a little
1:47
bit as a part of today's review So is
1:49
this a lens that you should consider
1:50
adding to your full-frame kit well
1:53
that's what we're going to dive in and
1:54
take a look at today First however this
1:56
lens was sent to me for examination from
1:59
a retailer but neither the retailer nor
2:02
the manufacturer has had any input on
2:04
this review They will not see it before
2:07
you do as the public So this is a fully
2:10
independent review and my findings are
2:12
mine alone Let's start by taking a look
2:15
at the build and handling All of these
2:17
lenses have initially come to E-mount as
2:20
is the case here with the 24mm However
2:23
in the passage of time we have seen for
2:25
both the 50 and 85 mm that a Zmount and
2:29
Lmount versions have come out And that
2:31
latter is I think even more interesting
2:33
to me And interesting to see whether or
2:35
not seven artisans will actually be a
2:37
part of the Lmount consortium if they
2:39
aren't already which would be really
2:41
interesting because then the lenses
2:42
could essentially be like first party
2:44
lenses there get better support in terms
2:46
of profiles and things like that Now as
2:50
mentioned the $290 $999 price tag is
2:53
cheaper than the competitors about $100
2:56
less And so certainly on the value side
2:59
of things there is positive there This
3:03
lens as has been the case for this
3:05
series they aren't particularly small
3:08
lenses Now not to say that they're huge
3:09
but the 50mm f1.8 was actually quite a
3:12
large lens The 85mm was surprisingly a
3:15
little smaller than the uh the 50mm and
3:19
this is very slightly smaller than what
3:22
even the 85 mm is And so it is a 72 mm
3:27
diameter which is 2.83 in 92 mm in
3:32
length or 3.6 in All three have had a
3:35
62mm front filter thread which is great
3:38
So you can share filters across them Now
3:40
what's surprising with the weight is
3:42
that while it's a little bit smaller
3:44
than the 85 millimeter lens at least in
3:46
terms of length it's actually just very
3:49
slightly heavier than that lens which I
3:51
can't quite explain What I can say
3:54
however is we do have a very nice build
3:56
quality here It's a very it's a great
3:59
looking lens It's a nice black anodized
4:02
finish a very clean design I even like
4:05
how that on the back and the what could
4:08
look a little bit blank They've added
4:09
the Seven Artisans logo there which I
4:12
think just kind of gives it a little bit
4:13
more of a cohesive look And then so we
4:16
have a decent amount of features We've
4:18
got an aperture ring AFMF switch we've
4:20
got a custom or function button here and
4:23
then of course the manual focus ring So
4:25
all of that is you know very worthwhile
4:28
The earliest uh the 50mm f1.8 8 which
4:31
was the first in the series It had kind
4:33
of a mushy AFMF switch They've really
4:35
cleaned that up However the switch feels
4:38
much more definite and precise The feel
4:40
of the function button feels good No
4:42
problem there The aperture ring is it's
4:46
a decllicked There's no click option
4:48
although it does show the one-third
4:50
stops Now they've cleaned up one of the
4:53
oddities on that and one of them still
4:55
remain So they have f1.8 8 and then f2
4:59
as marked positions But they showed two
5:02
one-third stop detents between f1.8 and
5:05
f2 which of course is nonsensical as
5:08
there is no stops or third stops between
5:11
f1.8 and f2 So that's a little
5:14
ridiculous However they have cleaned up
5:16
that it used to be that at f-16 which is
5:18
minimum aperture They also had markings
5:20
for um two 1/3 aperture stops after that
5:24
before you got to the automatic
5:27
uh option So again that that was
5:29
confusing in that f-16 is the smallest
5:32
min or the smallest aperture there And
5:34
so there is nothing beyond that And so
5:36
they do have a you know a reasonable
5:39
amount of weight between f-16 and the
5:42
automatic position It's not as hard or
5:45
definite as what I would like but at
5:46
least they've gotten rid of the notches
5:48
there So that's progress I was able to
5:51
do a reasonable aperture rack there It's
5:54
It's not incredibly smooth It's not
5:58
perfectly without any kind of visible
6:00
steps but not bad At least I was able to
6:02
pull it off And so a decent amount of
6:04
success there Now when it comes to the
6:06
manual focus ring the manual focus ring
6:09
has a decent amount of damping That
6:11
feels pretty good However unfortunately
6:14
when you're focusing I really did notice
6:17
some obvious steps You know this is with
6:20
all mirrorless lenses the input on the
6:22
manual focus ring goes through the focus
6:24
motor So um it's not a direct connection
6:27
but rather it flows the input that you
6:30
do on the ring goes through the focus
6:31
motors And in this case rather than
6:33
being able to focus in a smooth you know
6:36
linear sweep instead you will see little
6:39
steps along the way I don't love that
6:41
but it is what it is and I just need to
6:43
report on it Inside we have an 11bladed
6:47
uh rounded aperture which is nice It
6:50
does maintain a circular shape decently
6:52
and it also has a decent looking
6:53
sunburst effect or sun star when it is
6:56
stopped down There is a USB C port on
7:00
the lens mount and so that's good The
7:02
process for firmware updates is very
7:04
similar to what it was for Viltrox
7:07
lenses before they had their actual app
7:09
and Bluetooth but um and so it's it's
7:12
pretty straightforward pretty easy to do
7:14
Now we don't have which has been the
7:17
case for this whole series we don't have
7:18
a weather sealing gasket so it's not a
7:20
weather sealed lens However obviously we
7:23
do have a lens hood that is included It
7:26
doesn't click into place quite as
7:28
definite as what I would like And it
7:30
also is just feels a like a little bit
7:33
of a a tight fit And so it it doesn't
7:36
like rotate as smoothly as what I would
7:37
like However it's there It's included
7:40
You know it looks good with the lens
7:42
design Minimum focus distance here is 32
7:45
cm which is not great at all And so that
7:48
gives you a very low maximum
7:50
magnification I estimated about
7:53
0.09 times The Samyang for example
7:56
allows you to focus as closely as 19 cm
7:59
and gives you a much much higher level
8:02
of magnification So uh if you're you
8:05
know thinking about doing up close shots
8:07
with a 24 millimeter lens this is not
8:10
your guy Overall it is a nicely executed
8:13
package in many ways However some of the
8:16
fine details I don't feel are as well
8:18
executed here as what I saw in the 85 mm
8:21
I felt like the 85mm lens was progress
8:24
from the 50 millimeter This almost feels
8:26
like not a full step back but maybe a
8:28
half step back in the execution of some
8:31
of the fine details like the manual
8:32
focus ring and seeing those visible
8:35
steps How about autofocus autofocus
8:38
comes via an STM focus motor As far as
8:41
the focus speed the focus speed is not
8:44
bad It's relatively quiet in operation
8:47
No major concern on that front Typical
8:49
focus changes are nice and quick I
8:52
didn't think about it much in real world
8:53
use So no problem there Furthermore
8:57
accuracy at least when it comes to one
8:59
shot or single shot is excellent However
9:03
there has been an ongoing problem with
9:05
this series that continues to be the
9:06
case unfortunately and that is that if
9:09
there is any kind of movement for I just
9:12
tracked a my robo lawn mower moving
9:14
towards me It's not moving fast It's not
9:17
a difficult subject However you can see
9:20
from the burst that uh focus results are
9:22
all over the place So out of a 19shot
9:25
burst I believe that there were six that
9:28
were accurately focused during that time
9:30
So uh front and back focusing So anytime
9:33
you have action it just it doesn't do
9:35
the trick So I don't know if that's a
9:37
focus algorithm problem or if it's just
9:39
not enough thrust in the focus motors I
9:42
suspect it's really the former because
9:44
autofocus doesn't feel slow but it's
9:46
just not confident at all with any kind
9:49
of moving subject So that's something
9:51
you're going to need to be aware of On
9:53
the video side of things video AF
9:56
results are mostly good Focus changes
9:58
are fairly confident You know a little
10:00
bit of a micro pulsing or settling
10:02
periodically but not bad there My hand
10:05
test and the transition from my hand to
10:07
my eye it went uh fairly well as you can
10:12
overall focus transitions uh they felt
10:15
you know fine I would say I did see for
10:17
example in this clip where I was uh at
10:20
the marina in Pemrook and I was shooting
10:23
you know back and forth that you know
10:25
focus sometimes give me a little bit of
10:27
a a back rack And so but overall you
10:30
know not too bad in general
10:33
So when it comes to the image quality
10:35
side of things I'll give you a quick
10:37
overview and then if you want the deep
10:38
dive into the optics that will come at
10:40
the end of the video We have an optical
10:41
design of 14 elements in 11 groups That
10:45
includes as you can see from this
10:46
diagram extra low dispersion high
10:48
refractive index elements aspherical
10:51
lenses So about half of the elements
10:53
here are exotics which is you know
10:56
impressive for an inexpensive lens It
10:58
has a mostly strong optical performance
11:01
even at f1.8 8 And you can see here that
11:04
you're perfectly capable of shooting
11:05
wide open and even on a high resolution
11:08
61 megapixel body being able to deeply
11:10
crop and still have nice resolution
11:12
results I found that the distortion
11:16
pattern is there's a low amount of
11:18
distortion but it's a very complex
11:20
distortion And so that means that you
11:23
can't really connect for example the you
11:25
know there's what looks like pin cushion
11:26
distortion in the corners If you try to
11:28
correct for that you create barrel
11:30
distortion in the middle of the frame So
11:33
a very minor amount of correction of
11:35
minus one was about as good as I could
11:36
get it manually And so that leaves you
11:38
know probably let's say uh 4 fifths of
11:43
the the frame that looks good with just
11:46
the corners being affected with that
11:48
distortion That's about as good as I can
11:50
do Right now there isn't a correction
11:52
profile and 7R lenses at least on Sony
11:55
don't always get good profile support So
11:58
um hopefully that will change in the
12:00
future but that's the situation on the
12:03
ground at the moment Vignette isn't bad
12:05
particularly for a fast wide angle lens
12:08
It's 40 I used a plus 44 to correct
12:10
That's less than two stops No major
12:13
issue there Likewise there is some
12:15
minimal longitudinal chromatic
12:17
aberrations A little bit of fringing
12:19
before and after the plan of focus but
12:21
remember it's a wide angle lens and it
12:23
doesn't have a particularly close focus
12:25
distance So there's not going to be a
12:26
lot of situations where you're going to
12:28
have a shallow depth of field We're
12:30
going to see that anyway I don't think
12:31
it's much of a real world problem as you
12:33
can see from this shot of my old SLR Not
12:36
a lot of fringing showing up there I did
12:39
see some minor lateral chromatic
12:41
aberrations They definitely showed up on
12:43
my test chart However I didn't really
12:45
see them as much out in real world shots
12:48
And so I don't think it's going to be
12:49
much of a real world issue at least that
12:51
I can tell in terms of resolution And
12:54
again these are the crops are showing at
12:57
200% magnification on a 61 megapixel
13:02
A7R5 And so at f1.8 I found that the
13:05
center sharpness is very good I found
13:07
that the mid-frame was sharp but lower
13:11
contrast and then the corners were a bit
13:14
softer Um then at f2 there is not much
13:20
of an improvement but a more obvious
13:21
improvement by f2.8 8 and that is
13:24
impacting not only the center but now
13:26
the corners and the mid-frame are
13:27
starting to improve Actually found that
13:29
from f2.8 to f8 there wasn't really much
13:32
of a difference So the good news is that
13:34
if you stop down to f2.8 and even if
13:37
you're shooting in dimmer lighting
13:38
conditions as long as you don't need the
13:39
depth of field you're going to get
13:41
pretty close to maximum sharpness out of
13:43
the lens which is useful I found that
13:45
that sharpness was pretty consistent um
13:48
at from f8 to f11 Just a little bit of
13:51
softening due to defraction and a little
13:53
bit more obvious defraction showing up
13:57
f16 Now when it comes to the bokeh
14:00
quality again you know wide angle lens
14:02
so you're not going to get as much
14:03
defocus background I did find if there
14:05
were specular highlights in the frame
14:07
bokeh balls they're a little bit busy
14:10
But outside of that what I found is that
14:13
the overall quality of the blur really
14:15
looks pretty decent And again you're not
14:17
going to get a lot of strongly defocus
14:20
background but what I did seems to be
14:22
handled fairly nicely So I don't really
14:24
have any real reservations there When it
14:27
comes to flare resistance there is very
14:29
little veiling It holds contrast really
14:31
well which is important in a wide angle
14:33
lens However you will see somewhat of a
14:36
ghosting pattern like a flare pattern
14:38
It's not terribly destructive I don't
14:40
think it's a deal breaker on this lens
14:42
So overall flare not too bad So my
14:46
conclusion is this The build quality and
14:49
the optical performance are mostly that
14:52
of a more expensive lens In some ways
14:54
it's a lens that punches above its
14:55
weight I would say when it comes to
14:57
autofocus that autofocus is fine if
15:00
you're shooting single shot but if
15:03
you're wanting action or you're wanting
15:04
the flexibility of potentially doing
15:06
action uh Seven Artisans isn't quite
15:09
there yet There are a number of other
15:11
lens makers that are better than them in
15:13
this regard I would say that the Samyang
15:16
AF 24mm f1.8 while being $100 more
15:20
expensive is probably still my favorite
15:22
lens here on Sony at least because it is
15:26
so much smaller and lighter has better
15:29
autofocus It also does have weather
15:31
sealing and so it has a few things that
15:33
are missing on this It's not as nicely
15:36
built as the 7 Arson's lens but where
15:38
the rubber meets the road I feel like it
15:41
has enough to me to be worth that extra
15:44
$100 but your mileage may vary obviously
15:46
on that That could be a factor overall
15:49
However the Samyang lens is not going to
15:52
be available on either Nikon Z or Lmount
15:56
And so it really only is a factor as I'm
15:59
describing here on Sony Now if you want
16:02
more information you can dive into
16:05
either my text review which is linked in
16:07
the description down below There is an
16:09
image gallery link there along with some
16:10
buying links if you want to purchase one
16:12
And now if you would like to take a
16:14
little bit of a deeper look at the image
16:17
quality and the optical performance jump
16:19
in with me right now and let's see what
16:21
happens All right first of all we'll
16:23
take a look at vignette and distortion
16:25
You can see now taking a little bit
16:26
closer look the complexity of this
16:28
distortion pattern that I described
16:30
before So what you can see is on the
16:32
edges of the frame we've got some pin
16:33
cushion distortion However that pin
16:35
cushion distortion is not consistently
16:37
there So you can see here that if I move
16:39
to kind of uh take the bend out of the
16:42
corners here it would just kind of
16:44
pucker out the center and causing a
16:46
barrel distortion there So that's it's
16:48
what we call a mustache pattern where
16:50
it's not com it's not a linear
16:51
distortion in one direction or the other
16:53
So over here I've done a very mild minus
16:56
one but you can see even with that minus
16:58
one it's a little bit more bulged out in
16:59
the middle than it was here However it
17:02
does correct just a little bit of the
17:04
extremes on the cornal Your best kind of
17:06
case scenario is that if you're really
17:08
in a really critical situation step back
17:10
a little bit further and if you crop to
17:12
like this zone it's flawless It's just
17:14
really out on the edge that you have a
17:16
problem Vignette is really quite minor I
17:19
mean it's a plus 43 to correct That's
17:23
really not much at for f1.8 on a wide
17:26
angle lens So that's not a problem at
17:27
all Now you can see here there is some
17:30
longitudinal style chromatic aberrations
17:33
mostly in the form of this green
17:34
fringing after the plane of focus But
17:36
again there's not a lot of situations
17:38
where you're going to get close enough
17:39
and have such a shallow depth of field
17:41
that that's going to be a like an actual
17:43
problem And so in this case here yeah
17:45
you can see in a few spots there's some
17:47
very minor fringing but it's you know
17:50
you're you're not going to see that at
17:51
all at this distance which is the way
17:53
that just about everybody's viewing it I
17:55
also don't really see a whole lot of
17:57
distracting fringing around any specular
17:59
highlights However you can see that
18:00
those specular highlights really look
18:02
like I don't know some planetary bodies
18:05
There's a lot going on there Um and so
18:07
they're they're not really all that
18:09
clean looking Now lateral style
18:11
chromatic aberrations definitely show up
18:13
on my test chart You can see a lot of
18:14
that false color on either side of the
18:17
black and white transitions However in a
18:19
real world shot I went to this thinking
18:21
okay I'm definitely going to see it And
18:23
yes I mean you can see a little bit
18:24
there but I'm having to really look hard
18:26
for it and I'm not seeing a lot And this
18:29
is this should be a a great situation
18:32
particularly with this you know bright
18:34
white of the popppler there It should be
18:37
a great transition zone for that And I'm
18:39
not really seeing it So I'm not overly
18:41
concerned All right taking a look at
18:43
resolution Again 61 megapixels We're
18:45
going to look at 200% magnification
18:47
Center of the frame looks good Good
18:49
detail good contrast no concerns there
18:51
As we move towards the mid-frame again
18:54
the detail is good Resolution is fine
18:56
Contrast you can see is a little bit on
18:58
the low side If we pop on down here you
19:01
know this actually is quite consistent
19:03
in this zone No problem there And as we
19:05
move down towards the corner you can
19:07
just see that particularly as we get off
19:09
towards this edge of the frame the
19:11
resolution is just there's actually
19:13
still some decent contrast there but the
19:16
detail is not all that good So it's kind
19:17
of an inversion of what we saw in the
19:19
mid-frame Taking a quick look around we
19:22
can see we get roughly the same result
19:23
on the left side Uh upper left looking
19:26
good Upper right also looking good I
19:29
will say I think maybe the left side is
19:31
a little bit better than what the right
19:33
side is but it's it's not by any um big
19:36
margin at all Now taking that into a
19:38
real world shot at 100% this is f1.8 You
19:42
can see that here in the center of the
19:43
frame uh you know resolution looks fine
19:46
Contrast again is not like off the
19:47
charts good but you know no no real
19:49
problem there Depth of field is going to
19:52
affect a real world image You can see a
19:54
little bit of that lateral style
19:55
chromatic aberration in this shot but I
19:57
would say it certainly has usable
19:59
resolution all across the frame In a
20:02
better situation better lighting here I
20:05
feel like this image pops a bit more And
20:07
so in the center of the frame definitely
20:09
more detail and contrast And again depth
20:11
of field is not going to allow us to
20:12
really examine the corners here but the
20:15
image itself is holding up by and large
20:17
Now from f1.8 to f2 we can see a very
20:21
minor contrast gain um it is noticeable
20:24
but it's not significant However from f2
20:27
to f2.8 that becomes much more
20:29
pronounced and you can see here looking
20:30
at this text just how much higher the
20:33
contrast is here relative to what it is
20:35
at f2 Moving to the midframe you can see
20:38
a similar truth here that this looks
20:40
still kind of washed out while this is
20:42
becoming nice and high contrast If we
20:44
look up here into the uh upper left
20:47
corner you can see that it's looking
20:49
really really good right up into the
20:51
corner Only in that last little bit is
20:53
that resolution falling off If we take a
20:55
look down here at this corner you can
20:57
see it's it's actually a little shakier
20:58
here in general Contrast is definitely
21:00
better and detail is improving By f.6
21:04
it's looking really quite good
21:05
everywhere save maybe that last little
21:08
bit However in this uh on the side that
21:11
it's a little bit stronger it's looking
21:13
quite good up here into the corner Again
21:14
just that last little bit uh is not
21:17
quite as good At f11 you'll see a little
21:20
bit of softening due to defraction At
21:22
f-16 which is the minimum aperture it's
21:24
much more obvious And so avoid f-16
21:27
unless you absolutely need to go there
21:29
So obviously our magnification level is
21:32
very low And even though it's you're not
21:35
very close to the subject it's still
21:37
doesn't have a particularly flat plane
21:39
of focus either And so you can see a
21:41
pretty narrow area of focus and then it
21:43
really softens up you know past that
21:45
zone So unfortunately just not very flat
21:47
as far as the plane of focus So what
21:50
that means is that up close you're never
21:53
going to get super high resolution And I
21:55
also feel like the contrast isn't
21:56
amazing up close However the background
21:59
blur is really not bad I think that this
22:02
is actually relatively soft for a
22:04
wide-angle lens Again here the you can
22:07
see the background is not strongly
22:08
defocused but it is nicely defocused
22:12
There's no kind of distracting lines
22:14
It's not harsh at all Bokeh quality is
22:17
really quite good And this image I think
22:19
I mean this obviously I'd like to be
22:20
able to get closer than this and to get
22:22
a more strong background blur but the
22:25
quality of the bokeh I would say is
22:26
strong I didn't like it with specular
22:28
highlights but I like it with other
22:30
things Now as far as the color rendition
22:33
colors are good not great Uh it's kind
22:37
of like earlier Viltrox lenses where the
22:39
optical glass it again the colors don't
22:42
look bad but there's something about it
22:43
that feels just a little bit cheaper to
22:45
my eye having reviewed hundreds and
22:47
hundreds of lenses and I can tell
22:49
high-end optical glass from cheaper
22:51
optical glass and this feels cheaper But
22:53
again it's not bad You're going to be
22:55
able to get nicel looking images from it
22:57
Flare resistance again is not bad at all
23:00
Here at a a larger maximum aperture you
23:03
can see there's a bit of a ghosting
23:05
pattern but as we saw with the panning
23:07
back and forth it's not destructive
23:08
Here's a little bit closer look at that
23:10
22 bladed sun star And again when you're
23:12
This is at f11 by the way So you can see
23:15
that the ghosting patterns is a little
23:16
bit more pronounced but it's it's not
23:18
terrible And I'm not even trying to
23:20
avoid it here at this point Uh you know
23:22
I'm trying to maximize it So I think you
23:24
can pose in a way that it's it's a more
23:26
flattering So just watch out for that
23:28
And other than that you know not too bad
23:29
here with the optical performance So
23:32
thanks for watching until the end I hope
23:34
that the optical deep dive has helped
23:36
you to get a better sense as to whether
23:38
or not this inexpensive 7's lens is the
23:42
next one for your own kit As always
23:44
thanks for watching Have a great day and